I love this book: 'The Best of Punk Magazine'

Most fans of punk music have read Please Kill Me, Legs McNeil's excellent oral history of the genre. Back in the '70s, McNeil made a name for himself as the co-founder of Punk magazine, a publication that profiled dozens of punk acts before they became superstars.

'The Best of Punk Magazine' is on sale now.

Over the holidays I got my hands on the recently published Best of Punk Magazine (It Books, $30). I wasn't sure what to expect from these reprints, as I was too young to have read the original. What I found was breathtaking: This little independent rag managed to get up close and personal with Patti Smith, Iggy Pop, the Ramones — and on and on — and get them to say things most musicians today wouldn't dare.

For example, in Punk's lengthy interview with Lou Reed, founding editor John Holmstrom asks Reed to elaborate on his negative opinion of Bruce Springsteen ("He's already finished, isn't he? I mean, isn't he a has-been?"). In a lighter moment, he also gets the singer-songwriter's McDonald's order ("Quarter Pounder with cheese, with a thick milkshake.")

I should also mention that part of the Reed interview is illustrated as a comic strip (!) by Holmstrom. This is just one of the places where comics and punk music intersect; R. Crumb also contributed to the mag, and, in one interview, Patti Smith declares, "Comix and rock 'n' roll are the highest art forms."

Punk contains oodles of candid shots of Debbie Harry, Devo, Joey Ramone and others. Its "News" page looks like an early iteration of this blog's Early Buzz, with short blips about the Sex Pistols or Richard Hell. For a print publication, it managed to be very interactive and make readers feel part of a community; something like the "Patti Smith Grafitti Contest" could be a precursor to today's Photoshop contests.

If you're a punk fan, I'd say this hardcover is pretty essential to your collection. The pages are beautifully reprinted, and many images have been retouched/improved, so they look better than ever.

For more Punk, HarperCollins has an excerpt. Worn Free sells the famous T-shirt. I also came across this clip from an in-the-works documentary about the publication: